Dez Skinn reveals the origins of Vulcan (the comic, not the Star Trek planet)

Longtime British comics fan and indie publisher David McDonald, whose projects under his Hibernia Comics imprint include One Eyed Jack and the Death of Valiant and a fab Doomlord strip collection, writes to tell us he is busy working on his next Comic Archive title, provisionally titled Beyond 2000.

In the process, he's gathered a motley assemblage of interesting material, some of it he's unable to find space for in the final Archive - so is instead running items of note on his blog and Facebook page, starting with this fascinating piece about the 1970s Vulcan comic, which he's kindly given us permission to publish on downthetubes.

Vulcan was a weekly comic published by IPC from 1975 to 1976, reprinting strips such as Mytek the Mighty, Trigan Empire and Steel Claw from other IPC titles. Unusually, the comic was originally published only in Scotland, but switched to nationwide publication after 30 issues, lasting for 28 more issues before merging into Valiant.

Bizarrely, longtime editor Dez Skinn, who was working at IPC when Vulcan was published, tells David Vulcan wasn't really an IPC product.

"In his spare time [Valiant editor] Sid Bicknell put it together editorially for Europe, with Jan Shepherd as art editor.

"It came about because Syndication International was making an absolute fortune for IPC by selling Fleetway strips abroad," Dez reveals, "even though their success was foolishly never costed into the viability of titles. So some bright spark had the idea of selling an entire comic to foreign publishers, instead of individual strips. The big gimmick being the low cost price to each because they'd all be printed at the same time (in Italy, I think).

"So it was an early co-production for various countries (hence all the words, including the cover masthead were in black, so the fifth (language) plate could be changed easily when printing all at the same time for different languages without need to change any of the colour plates. They'd print off from the full four colour plates for everybody including a black artwork plate, giving it a print run beyond a million, then overprint different languages from a second black plate, a different one for each individual territory.

"This way, you could have a full colour comic, even in a territory which could only support a print run of only 25,000 or so. (Very cost effective).

"Because it was so cheap (and nasty, on horrible flimsy paper which usually fell apart at newsagents), it was an easy job to run-on copies in English for the UK with a ridiculously low breakeven, provided it sold well enough abroad to keep going. I seem to remember the German edition, Kondor, proved very popular. 

 

"But it wasn't liked in-house, not being a "proper" comic, with no full time staff or any origination, and on that awful cheap paper! Everybody felt it undermined their work, being a cheap little reprint, the thin end of the wedge, and Sid and Jan weren't very popular for agreeing to do it.

... so now you know!"

• Keep track of Hibernia Comics releases at http://hiberniabook.blogspot.co.uk

 

• Visit Dez's excellent site dezskinn.com for the lowdown on all his titles

I Went to Malta and all I got was This Great Comic Convention

Guests are greeted for the Malta Comic Convention. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

Writer, editor and comics event organizer Richmond Clements reports on his visit to Malta as a guest of the island's increasingly popular annual comic convention. British guests this year included Dave Gibbons, Sean Azzopardi, Tim Perkins, Dez Skinn and other creators from around the globe...


I was lucky enough to be a guest at the Malta Comic Con this year.

So, while this is a kind of review/overview of the event, I will freely admit that a lot of what I say may be swayed by my position as a guest.

Sunny Malta! Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

First off: Malta itself. It is gorgeous. A truly stunning place with thousands of years of history oozing out of every corner, and inhabited by some of the most warm and friendly people I have ever encountered. The weather was, for the most part, great. (Well, I thought it was great. The locals seemed to consider temperatures in the mid-teens to be signalling the next Ice-Age, but it was t-shirt and shorts weather for me!)

Inside the Malta Comic Convention at St James Cavalier in Valletta. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

The venue, St James Cavalier in Valletta, is one that any other convention on the planet would struggle to match. Certainly, it’s the only convention that I am aware of that is held in a 700 year old fort! Tables are spread throughout the venue on multiple floors. This did make for an initial bit of confusion when finding your way about, but after a lap or two, things were a lot clearer.

And there were an impressive array of books for sale. They ranged from the usual dealers selling graphic novels and action figures, to some incredible local talents.

The Pilot team. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

One of these books is Pilot. The publishers and creators, all local Maltese folks, had just published the second edition in time from this convention. It is an astounding book, both in the production value and content. It is something all involved should be very proud of. In my opinion, it’s matching in quality anything I have seen for a UK publisher. Seek this book out and order yourself a copy if at all possible.

Tim Perkins delivers a comic art workshop for Maltese schoolchildren. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

Sean Azzopardi sketching at the event. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

Emma Emma Ríos delivers a Guided Tour of her exhibition. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

 Dave Gibbons meets Maltese comic fans. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

As usual, the event was held over the weekend, and even though there were a few last-minute cancellations, most of the guests managed it, and from what I heard, all of them enjoyed themselves.

The venue and general size of the event help lend it a wonderful, friendly atmosphere. The kind of atmosphere that Hi-Ex!, which I co-organize in Inverness has, in fact. There were a lot of families and children there, and all were enjoying themselves.

Richmond Clements with cosplayer and cosmaker Federica di Nardo. Photo courtesy Richmond Clements

It is always pleasing to talk to people who don’t read comics, but thought they’d turn up and have a look, and then they end up buying some stuff. This, to me, is what these events are all about: introducing comics to a new generation and showing them the possibilities and scope of the medium.

The celebratory meal in Valletta, in front of the St John's Co-Cathedral. Photo courtesy Malta Comic Con

So, on our final night in Malta, we had a wonderful meal with all the remaining guests and organisers. I was forced to eat octopus. (Not like in Oldboy, though).

After the meal, there were, of course, a few speeches.

During one of these, organiser Chris Le Galle said that one of their ambitions is to try to create a comic community in Malta.

Well, Chris, from what I seen over the weekend, you can stop trying. You have already done it. There is a vibrant and exciting comics community in Malta, and these guys are to be thanks for it.

What they need now is support to help make it grow. So, buy their comics and visit their convention! And don’t think it’s out of your price range either. It cost me less to go to Malta than to the Bristol Convention, after all...

• For more information about the Malta Comic Con visit www.maltacomic-con.com or find them on Facebook

• The Pilot Comic Anthology Richmond mentions above  is a collection of short comics, each drawn and written by a different artist or author. Every volume of Pilot features a new theme, the first one being Steampunk and the second and latest book being Medieval. The book places a strong emphasis on variation of comic styles and stories that can be enjoyed by a wide variety of audience.
If you're interested in purchasing Pilot, drop an email to  info@maltacomic-con.com 

Ace Doctor Who fanzine Vworp Vowrp returns

The team behind the wonderful Doctor Who fan magazine Vworp Vworp - a fanzine about the long-running and best-seling Doctor Who Magazine - are taking pre-orders for their second issue

The new issue includes an all-new comic strip featuring the Dalek killing anti-hro Abslom Daak, created by Steve Moore and Steve Dillon.

Editor Colin Brockhurst tells us they're aiming to publish in late August or early September after quite a break since Issue 1 - testament to the huge amount of work being put into the title, which even includes a smashing-looking free gift featuring art by Adrian Salmon.

Contents include

• The first half of an exhaustive Abslom Daak tribute, including interviews with writer Steve Moore, and artists Steve Dillon and David Lloyd. 
• There's also a Daak comic strip, written for Doctor Who Magazine by Steve Moore in 1980 but withdrawn after a disagreement with the editor, now finally brought to the page by DWM artists Martin Geraghty, Adrian Salmon and Roger Langridge.
• A series of DWM editor interviews kicks off with a fascinating chat between founding Dez Skinn and current head honcho Tom Spilsbury. The magazine also chats to Paul Neary, Alan McKenzie, Cefn Ridout and the elusive Sheila Cranna.
• Ex-Doctors Tom Baker and Colin Baker talk about their comic strip selves.
• Dave Gibbons, Steve Parkhouse and Mick McMahon discuss The Tides of Time and Junkyard Demon, and we take in The Lodger with Gareth Roberts and Mike Collins.
• Plus there's more comic strip - The Housekeeper, a story written by Paul Magrs and drawn by Bret M Herholz starring Mrs Wibbesey and the Fourth Doctor.

Vworp Vworp 2 comes with two covers: a wraparound Abslom Daak cover by Mike Collins, and an early Doctor Who Monthly pastiche featuring Junkyard Demon (with Jason Fletcher and Ben Willsher’s take on Daak on the back.

Plus, there's a fantastic free gift in the form of a ‘Vworpabix’ board game. Based on the 1970s Weetabix game, Vworp Vworp's has 16 character cards by Adrian Salmon and boards by Paul Grist, Jon Pinto, Leighton Noyes and Graeme Neil Reid.

A very limited edition magazine, you can pre-order it here from the Vworp Vworp web site!

Vworpabix board game

Warrior Remembered in Manchester

Legendary British comics editor Dez Skinn is back in Manchester again next weekend (he was there only a couple of weeks ago for the relaunch of Starburst). "There's an all-day celebration of one of my old titles reaching its 30th birthday...," he tells us. "That's WARRIORcon on Saturday July 2 from 11-5pm at the city's top pub: The Lass O'Gowrie .

"And if you're a Doctor Who fan, book in somewhere cheap for the night and get back to the pub the next day for their fourth Doctor Who pubcon (and Kev F's Scottish Falsetto Glove Puppets). You could even stay for Monday and catch me old chum Mr B do his chap-hop routine at the same venue."

Full details: www.thelass.co.uk

Comics and more at the Lass!

(Above: They won! A rather natty promotional image for the Lass O'Gowrie pub in Manchester.)

Word from Gareth Kavanagh of the award-winning Lass O'Gowrie pub in Manchester of various comics-related events that are likely to be of interest to downthetubes readers:

First there's Warriorcon on 2nd July with Dez Skinn and guests. This celebrates cult anthology comic Warrior, the original home of V for Vendetta.

On 3rd July there's Vworp 4, a Doctor Who con that includes some guests from the world of British comics. These are Martin Geraghty, Adrian Salmon and Dez Skinn, all of whom have been closely involved with Doctor Who Magazine's comic strips. The con also features various other figures from the world of Who, such as Katy Manning (Third Doctor companion, Jo Grant) and Andrew Cartmel (the programme's script editor during Sylvester's McCoy's tenure).

And, as part of the Lass's Pub Fiction slot, some comic creators will be giving talks:

On 19th July, John Reppion of the Moore/Reppion writing team (Raise the Dead/Albion) presents a talk on different incarnations of the cities of Liverpool and Manchester, real and imagined, in his own writing, the work of others and beyond.

22nd July sees an audience with Al Ewing, a British comics writer with extensive experience in the small press and 2000 AD.

And on 23rd July, Bryan Talbot discusses his graphic novels Grandville and Grandville Mon Amour and the venerable and on-going tradition of anthropomorphic characters in illustration and comics from which they have emerged.

These events are all part of the pub's annual Lassfest, which runs from 1st July - 1st August. This showcases all aspects of the arts, with live theatre, readings, stand-up comedy and much, much more. Go here and scroll down to see what's on when.

Jody MacGregor's '100 Comics to Read Before You Die' reaches Top Ten

(with thanks to Dez Skinn for the tip off): Over the last few years, there has been a plethora of rushed and badly researched books on the top graphic novels, often too tightly focused on
US product.

But writer Jody MacGregor has slowly and painstakingly been putting together a superb choice of top titles on his blog that top editor and writer Dez Skinn strongly recommends you have a read of.

"For over three years now I've been slowly amassing a series on my blog called, with tongue somewhat in cheek, 100 Comics To Read Before You Die (or grow out of them)," Jody says. "For the next couple of weeks, I'll be posting the final 10.

"It's been a pretty big project and it may have taken its toll on my sanity a little bit there."

The list is impressive, including titles by British creators such as Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers of Victory (at Number 17); Raymond Briggs Ethel and Ernest (No. 19), Dave McKean's Cages, Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie's Phonogram, Hannah Berry's Britten and Brulightly, Warren Ellis's NextWave, Pat Mills and Hunt Emerson's Diceman, Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and many others, as well as some terrific titles from the US, manga and other countries.

It will be intriguing to see if any British creators make it into Jody's Top Ten - but based on his list so far, we think it's a safe bet. Pay credit to this mammoth task and take a look.

• Chck it out at: http://jody- macgregor. livejournal. com/tag/100comics

Garry Leach Marvelman art auction begins

British comics guru Dez Skinn is running an auction for a rare piece of Marvelman art by Garry Leach.

On offer is Marvelman Episode 3, page 1 (which first appeared in Warrior Issue 3).

"As an experiment, partially because of resenting the massive percentage eBay takes and partially because it's on behalf of a friend, this will be a public auction done through my Wall on Facebook, along with Paypal for the winner," says Dez. "Once in Facebook, enter "Dez Skinn" to view.

The auction is now open and will finish on August 8th at 10.00pm (British Summer Time).

"It's an experimental use of Facebook Events, so apologies in advance if you encounter any difficulties finding it," says Dez. "If you don't wish to join Facebook, email me directly for progress reports [via Dezskinn1ATyahoo.co.uk] and bidding information. Updates to all interested parties who ask for such will be sent out every few days."

The opening bid for is £200.

• This auction will close promptly at 10.00pm British Summer Time, Sunday August 8, 2010. Payment by Paypal only. Post free internationally, recorded delivery. For more info on the auction outside Facebook, visit Dez's blog here

Tube Surfing: Mazeworld, Mad Science and Harvey Pekar

Does the sporadically torrential rain of the last few days mean that's all the summer we're going to get? I hope not.

Onto the Tube Surf...

• Arthur Ranson sends word that Daniel Clifford, a fan of the artist's Mazeworld strip (produced in collaboration with writer Alan Grant), has set up a Facebook petition to get the strip re-published.

Arthur has written about Daniel's efforts over at his blog. "I, of course, believe a collection of the entire Mazeworld in one fat edition would be a nice thing to have," he notes, "but the reason this petition thing excites me is the thought of a social network of fans using their connection to create an outcome.

"Coincidentally in Saturday’s Guardian Review section there was a review of Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age by Clay Shirkey whose suggestion is that the brainpower wasted with passive entertainment watching might be used via the internet to organise and do something in concert. Shirkey quotes examples of charities that have been set up. A Mazeworld reprint doesn’t have that significance but hey, we can be shallow too."

If you want to check out some pages from Mazeworld, you can do so at Arthur Ranson's website.

• Meanwhile, in Manchester, there are two events with British comic connections happening at the Lass O'Gowrie pub over the weekend as part of their epic Lass fest event.

The first, The Hammer House of Dezza, kicks off on Saturday at 3.00pm. It features veteran British comics editor Dez Skinn, who will be talking about his time at the helm of Hammer House of Horror Magazine, which included in its pages comic strips.

The second is on Sunday. It's Vworp 3, a one-day Doctor Who convention that numbers among its guests the aforementioned Dez Skinn and comic artist Adrian Salmon, alongside the likes of Doctor Who writers Terrance Dicks, Andrew Cartmel, Rob Shearman and actress Sophie Aldred, who played companion Ace alongside Seventh Doctor Sylvester McCoy.

• Speaking of events, there's lots forthcoming from the folks at Alternative Press (who describe themselves as "...a group of artists, comix creators, writers and poets dedicated to encouraging creativity through self-publishing").

The group has lots of exciting news, available via the above link, of fairs and exhibitions, including the Alternative Press Fair in November, Tunbridge Wells Zine Fest in August and much, much more.

Hang on, if I'm mentioning events, surely I've got to talk about Caption... I know John's plugged it recently, but it's well worth a reminder. Oxford's annual convention celebrates all things comics, but primarily the small press, with the theme of 'Mad Science' this year.

It looks like it's going to be another cracking event, with guests such as Melinda Gebbie, Jeremy Day, Al Davison and Darryl Cunningham all attending. I'll be along too as a punter and I can't wait!

Caption 2010 is held over two days on the weekend of 31st July.

This Tube Surf has been a bit verbose. Let's go for some quick hits:

• Rob Jackson makes ice cream and comics, and his blog is always worth a look.

• Dan McDaid goes all 'TV Action' for a pal, with a page of art homaging Doctor Who as he appeared in the 1970s comic Countdown. Oh yes!

• Adam Cadwell pays tribute to the recently deceased Harvey Pekar. He's also set up a Flickr group for pictorial tributes to Harvey. R.I.P. Mr Pekar...

And on that sad note, it's goodbye until my next Tube Surf...

Photo Review: Dundee Comics Day 2010

Now in its fourth year, the Dundee Comics Day treads the fine line between the accessibility of a public lit fest, as it is part of the Dundee Literary Festival, and the sensibilities of an academic conference since it is located in Dundee university and run by academics. This year it hit the balance perfectly.

Run by Dr Chris Murray of the University's Humanities department, each Comics Day has a theme and this year's was Creating Comics, from writing and illustrating, via editing and designing, through to publishing. As well as organising the Comics Day, Chris is co-editor, along with Julia Round of Bournemouth University, of the new academic journal Studies In Comics and free copies of the first issue of this 186 page, oversized A5, landscape magazine were available to those attendees who were interested. The first issue is also available free online from its publishers, Intellect Books. Those of us who have been to many of Chris' events in the past are aware of his line in sartorial elegance and this year he didn't disappoint with a day-glo green tie against a red shirt.

The day began at 11am in the university's spacious and well equipped D'Arcy Thompson Lecture Theatre with a one hour workshop on drawing manga run by Manga Shakespeare artist Nana Li who went on to join the signing sessions later on in the afternoon. Dundee University runs a popular annual manga/anime convention called D-Con so it was surprising that this manga workshop wasn't better attended but then the Dundee Comics Day is normally a small, intimate affair and it would perhaps lose some of its friendliness if it had a much bigger turnout.



As well as the friendliness, the other plus point for Dundee is that the cost for the entire day was £10, which included an ongoing supply of refreshments. While this is a fairly standard price for a single day at a comics convention, for a literary festival it is a bargain. The Edinburgh International Book Festival this year would charge £54 plus booking fees for five guest talks and an art workshop, with refreshments extra and the guests escorted to and from their talks leaving the only chance to talk to them being at any post talk signing sessions. Things are rather different in Dundee.

The main afternoon session began with artist and designer Rian Hughes. While Rian has various comic strips to his credit, including Grant Morrison's Dare, 2000AD's Robo-Hunter and The Science Service by downthetubes' own John Freeman, he spends most of his time as a graphic designer so his talk had the potential to be perhaps the least interesting of the day. However as he took us through the type of work he does, including advertising posters for The Body Shop, point of sale illustrations for Clark's Shoes, designs for Swatch Watches, and a multitude of book illustrations including those for Geri Halliwell's children's books, his ability to articulate his design choices and his enthusiasm for what he does shone through and made for a very interesting talk.



Marvelman and Excalibur artist Alan Davis was next with a heavily illustrated talk on how he creates a page of comic art from the initial thumb nail sketches, through pencilling and inking to the final coloured product. He explained how he saw some pages as being 'silent' despite them having text boxes and speech balloons because the artwork was enough to explain the story of the page, compared to those pages that needed the text for the reader to understand what was happening. As a superhero artist he explained why he believed in "swoosh" lines to indicate movement and how they could be incorporated without being overly distracting by drawing the character's anatomy around the movement lines. Since Alan chose to sit at the lecturers desk at the front of the large lecture theatre there was no distraction of him walking around as he presented page after page of his superb art to the rapt audience and I'm sure that I wasn't the only one with a pang of disappointment when he announced that he had reached his final page. Questions for Alan followed before a break during which there was a signing session in the Tower Building's reception area by Rian and Alan.



Also in the reception area, along with sales tables from the local comics shop, Black Hole, and local comics merchandiser, Fine and Dandy, was an exhibition of the late Willie Richie's work. Sadly this DC Thomson artist, who was a great comics fan and collector, passed away earlier this year and the exhibition showed the range of his talent using original artwork from the DC Thomson archives. This ranged from his minimalist art for Baby Crockett to the rather more detailed art for Simple Spyman, both from Beezer, as well as covers for Sparky, designed to be coloured as part of the production process, and full colour pages from the nursery comic Bimbo. This free exhibition will remain open until 21 August 2010.


After the refreshment and signing break, former DC Thomson editor Bill Graham gave a talk on Willie's work for DC Thomson concentrating on the work that both men had done for what Thomson's refer to as "Pony Stories", the comic strips they produce for the European Egmont comic Wendy. This explained one of the pages in the exhibition which no one seemed to recognise, a humorous horse strip called Snooty and Scamp. This was created for Wendy with Bill writing and Willie illustrating some 800 pages of the strip over the years which was then translated into German and Swedish amongst other languages. The exhibition, along with Bill's fond memories and amusing anecdotes, were a fitting tribute to his friend and colleague.



The afternoon then continued with a talk from Dez Skinn. Writer, editor, manager, publisher, Dez has had such a varied career that the choice of what he was going to talk about had prompted some discussion between attendees earlier in the day. His decision to tell us the history of fan favourite magazine House Of Hammer was a popular choice with his animated and amusing talk covering artists as diverse as Brian Lewis, Dave Gibbons, Joe Colquhoun, Paul Neary and John Bolton as well as the early concepts for the magazine that we all refer to as HoH but which Dez had originally planned to call Chiller. Dez's recollections on HoH and his other work can also be read on his new website, dezskinn.com.



The final talk of the day was from writer and editor Pat Mills. With a career spanning DC Thomson as well as IPC titles such as Battle, Action and 2000AD, Pat chose to focus on his French bande dessinee series Requiem: Chevalier Vampire. This series with Giger-esque painted art by Olivier Ledroit has reached nine albums in France along with four albums of the spin-off series Claudia: Chevalier Vampire with art by Franck Tacito. The first two Requiem albums have just been released in English by Panini as Requiem: Vampire Knight and Pat took the audience through the creation of the albums and his relationship with its foreign artist. He also emphasised the point that British creators should not just be looking to America to get their work published but to France as well. In addition to allowing creators to retain the rights to their work, French publishers deal with a considerably greater range of titles and styles as well as a much greater volume of published copies. He pointed out that sales in the French language of the first album of Requiem alone were in the region of 100,000 which, while an order of magnitude less than say a Jean Van Hamme title, is easily an order of magnitude more than any UK graphic novel print run. Pat's interesting and thoughtful talk left more than one creator in the audience with the realisation that they should be looking across the Channel as well as the Atlantic with their work.



The day closed with a popular signing session in the reception area from Pat, Dez and Nana. One of the strengths of Dundee is the friendly atmosphere that exists outside the main lecture theatre with sales tables, exhibitions and refreshments all in the same area and the willingness of the guests to stand and chat to the attendees as well as to sign items outside of the slightly more formal signing sessions. Indeed where else could you talk to the editor of Warlord having just spoken to the editor of Battle or, as below, see the current Tharg's newest artdroid, Graeme Neil Reid, share a joke with the original Tharg, Pat Mills.


Fans of older British comics who despair at the dearth of titles on newsagents shelves compared to what there used to be for readers any older than junior primary, or who find the obsession that much of British comics fandom has with imported American superhero product strange, especially given its minuscule UK sales, have long found that mainstream UK comics conventions do not cater for them. These fans are as interested in what has gone before as in what they can get now and they have often bemoaned the fact that there are no "old comics" conventions. This year's Dundee Comics Day was as close to an "old comics" convention that I have come across, yet with a selection of creators with such impressively diverse careers that any mainstream comics convention would have been proud to have had them on their guest list.

The Dundee Comics Day has been the highlight of my comics year so far and I look forward in anticipation to what Chris Murray and his team have in store for next year.

The Dundee Courier newspaper covered the Dundee Comics Day here.

Dundee Comics Day - 1 Week To Go

There is just 1 week left before the fourth annual Dundee Comics Day, part of the Dundee Literary Festival, which is taking place at Dundee University's Tower Building on Sunday 27 June.

This year's theme is Creating Comics and the guest speakers for the day include artist Alan Davis, designer Rian Hughes, writer Pat Mills and editor Dez Skinn. With the addition of a workshop on creating Manga run by artist Nana Li, Dundee's impressive line-up of guests cover the entire range of comics creation from writing and artwork, via design and editing, through to publishing the end product.

As in previous years, the day will also include the opening of a comics exhibition in the University's Lamb Gallery. After the Beano's 70th birthday exhibition and last year's 30th anniversary of Starblazer, the subject of this year's exhibition is the late DC Thomson humour artist Bill Richie, perhaps best known for his work on Baby Crockett in the Beezer.

Tickets for the full day, beginning at 11am and finishing at 7pm, are £10 for adults and £5 for children under 13 and the cost of the ticket includes refreshments during the day.

More details of the Dundee Comics Day are available on the Dundee Literary Festival's website and tickets can be purchased from the University's on-line store.

The downthetubes review of last year's Dundee Comics Day is here and the review of the Starblazer exhibition is here.

Tube Surfing: Dez Skinn, Fanzines Galore and Simone Lia

Right, what's happening out there...

Lew Stringer's ace comics blog informs us that Dez Skinn has a new website. Dez was, of course, the man behind such titles as Warrior, Comics International and Doctor Who Weekly (still with us as Doctor Who Magazine).

Warwick Johnson Cadwell has posted his ace A.B.C Warriors strip from new 2000 AD fanzine, Nu Earth online at his blog. Warwick sent me a copy of the fanzine and I have to say it's, well, zarjaz. Will Kirkby has done the same with the pencils for his cracking contribution, a fab Rogue Trooper strip. Tharg, employ these men now!!!

Paul Gravett's new article about and interview with cartoonist Simone Lia is well worth checking out. In the interview, Simone talks about various topics, including her new work-in-progress, a graphic novel about her relationship with God:

"I was passing through Leicester Square almost three years ago and the bubbling inspiration came to me and I had a fuzzy vision of the completed story whilst standing near a red telephone box," she explains. "I was so excited and happy to be suddenly inspired again, I had a sense the book would be about an adventure with God. When it came to starting the work however I really didn’t know how to go about having an adventure with God and how I might show it in a comic. Showing that relationship is such a personal thing. Part of me definitely did not want to open that up for everyone to see but the feeling to make the book didn’t go away. It’s been taking a long time to produce partly because of that uncertainty of depicting this personal area of my life and also because the story in real life has had to unravel."

Paul also sends word of an opportunity for creators of humorous zines and comics to have their work displayed in the reading room at Tate Britain as part of their Rude Britannia exhibition.

Here's the skinny, from the Tate's website:

"Help us curate the reading room of the Rude Britannia exhibition with an array of humorous fanzines, comics and home made publications. Rude Britannia: British Comic Art celebrates all that is comical, satirical, political, absurd and bawdy in British art from 1600s to today and we would like you to respond to these themes. The best fanzines will be selected by curator Cedar Lewisohn and placed in the exhibition space for a period of time. Please only send publications that you think are funny. We will notify you if your publication has been selected, but we cannot commit to sending your publication back to you."

And finally, small press comics news blog Bugpower draws our attention to another opportunity for self-publishers:

"Cerebus.TV are starting a "Small Press Comics Focus" feature, and they are looking for submissions for future episodes. Email indie@exoss.net for details. You can see a promo for the first one HERE. The 'pilot' has been put together by the guys at Cerebus.tv and features the minicomics of Dan Fish (Hey, that's ME). It appears as part of Episode 30, which streams online starting Friday 18th June and 24/7 all week long."

Clint: The Origin of Mark Millar's new comic title

For those not already wondering, veteran publisher and editor Dez Skinn has just explained the origins of Mark Millar's new comic title, CLINT, which Titan Magazines launch later this year.

If you're easily offended by bad language, don't read on.

"Back in the 1970s when IPC was rocking saleswise, there were two words you could never use in print in their holier-than-thou weekly comics: FLICK and CLINT," Dez notes in a posting to his Quality Communications group on Yahoo.

"Because Gravesend's letterpress printing was so blotchy the space between the capital letters L and I was virtually non-existent, so LI looked far more like a U.

"Hence the adage oft-heard in the corridors of Fleetway House..., FLICK OFF CLINT!

"It gives a whole new meaning to the old book/film/TV series My Friend Flicka," he adds wryly.

Comics International publisher company dissolved

Cosmic Publications, previously publishers of Comics International (and, for a while, Dangerous Ink magazine), has been dissolved.

News broke after fans of Comics International spotted the dissolution of the company on the Companies House web site spelling an end, perhaps, to any further speculation that the much-loved comics news magazine created by veteran editor and publisher Dez Skinn might one day return.

Cosmic Publications bought Comics International from Dez after interest from several other publishers. Edited by Mike Conroy, sadly, the takeover proved problematic almost immediately, with late running publication and internal issues affecting production, before the magazine finally disappeared.

Despite several request for updates, downthetubes and other comics media made no headway with publisher Peter Boyce, who last claimed the title was "not dead" last September.

"Comics International dead?" Peter Boyce, also owner of Movie New Media told us. "It's news to me."

His comments came despite the lack of any regular issues, with the last publications being two Comics International Specials last July.

If the dissolution of Cosmic Publications means Comics International has now gone for good, will anyone step up and take on the title?

downthetubes understands that several companies have considered a new British-based comics magazine - aside, of course, from the British comics-devoted Crikey! - but have been waiting patiently to see if and when CI might return.

• More comments on the apparent demise of Comics International on the downthetubes forum

Dundee Comics Day 2010

The fourth annual Dundee Comics Day, part of the Dundee Literary Festival, will take place at Dundee University on Sunday 27 June 2010 and this year's theme is Creating Comics.

The guest speakers have now been announced and include Alan Davis, Rian Hughes, Pat Mills and Dez Skinn. With the addition of a workshop on creating Manga run by Nana Li, Dundee's impressive line-up of guests cover the entire range of comics creation from writing and artwork, via design and editing, through to publishing the end product.

As in previous years, the day will also include the opening of a comics exhibition in the University's Lamb Gallery. After the Beano's 70th birthday exhibition and last year's 30th anniversary of Starblazer, the subject of this year's exhibition is the late DC Thomson humour artist Bill Richie, perhaps best known for his work on Baby Crockett in the Beezer.

Tickets for the full day, beginning at 11am and finishing at 7pm, are £10 for adults and £5 for children under 13 and the cost of the ticket includes refreshments during the day.

More details of the Dundee Comics Day are available on the Dundee Literary Festival's website and tickets can be purchased from the University's on-line store.

The downthetubes review of last year's Dundee Comics Day is here and the review of the Starblazer exhibition is here.

John Watkiss' Sherlock Holmes Art on Sale

Dez Skinn's Quality Communications is offering a limited edition collection of movie concept art by comics creator John Watkiss he did for a proposed Sherlock Holmes movie via eBay.

"One member of our funnybook community whose quality of work far exceeds his profile is John Watkiss," says Dez. "I first knew his classical linework in Acme's old Ring of Roses, written by Das Petrou and reprinted by Dark Horse (and now in pre-production as a Hollywood movie).

"No stranger to film, John spent 15 years working in tinseltown for Disney (and has a some seriously scary stories about such). He's back in Blighty now, and working on a Robert E Howard production. But his last major work was as concept artist for fellow Brit Lionel Wigram, a film producer who had the hots on for making a young Sherlock movie. John produced 18 pieces of concept art which Wigram used to sell the idea."

Dez is offering a unique behind-the-scenes limited edition of the art, offered exclusively on eBay, revealing how the movie would look long before Ritchie, Law or Robert Downey Jr were involved.

On offer are limited edition prints of 18 pen and ink drawings which made the movie happen. Each plate is reproduced on high quality 240gsm glossy card, measuring 11.75 x 8.25", and suitable for framing. This portfolio comes with an annotations page, detailing both the history of the film and descriptions of each print, written by Dez.

Produced by Quality Communications, this is a strictly limited edition of 500 sets, with each top plate signed by the artist and numbered.

• Check the portfolio out here on eBay

• Check out the Quality Communications store on eBay - lots of British Comics goodies!

Sci-Fi London Lines Up Comic Creator events

Garry Leach, Rian Hughes, Dez Skinn, Gary Erskine, Emma Vieceli and Simon Furman are just some of the comic creators who will be appearing at this year's SCI-FI-LONDON event on Saturday 1st May.

At last year’s SCI-FI-LONDON (www.sci-fi-london.com) the organisers added the notion of Sci-Fi Labs to the festival line-up: panel discussions which mixed artists, writers, scientists and cultural commentators to explore various SF themed topics. This format and a screening of Hardware introduced comic book creators such as Kevin O’Neill, Bryan Talbot, Paul Cornell, Daniel Merlin Goodbrey and Paul Duffiel to SCI-FI-LONDON in 2009 and this year's event sees an increase in the number of events featuring top British graphic novelists which are sure to interest downthetubes readers.

Now in its ninth year, SCI-FI-LONDON is the UK's only dedicated Sci-Fi and Fantasy film festival, screening world and UK film premieres, documentaries and a selection of classic SF titles. SCI-FI-LONDON also has a strong international shorts programme and screens a short film with every feature screening. It also holds a film school and filmmaking competitions to encourage more science fiction films to be made in the UK.

This year's comic-related events are as follows:

Screening: The Hospital Of Transfiguration - Thursday 29 April 6.30pm

Country: Poland, Year: 1979, Dir: Edward Zebrowski, Runtime: 90mins, Language: Polish/English subtitles
Format: 35mm, Source: Polish Cultural Institute

Set in 1943, this film is based on Stanislaw Lem’s first novel, and chronicles the experiences of a young doctor starting out in a mental hospital. But who is more crazy here the patients or the doctors? Semi-autobiographical, the controversial nature of the story led to the book being suppressed by the authorities in the 1950s.


Introduction and Q&A with Andrzej Klimowski, a world-renowned film poster designer and graphic novelist. In the UK, his visual style proved too controversial when his poster for Luis Buñuel’s The Phantom of Liberty was banned by the London Underground. As a writer and artist, he has authored three graphic novels, The Secret, The Depository and Horace Dorlan. With his wife, Danusia Schebal he has adapted Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde and The Master and Margarita to comic book format. Andrzej and Danusia were active participants in the Warsaw film scene in the late 1970s and Professor Klimowski chose The Hospital Of Transfiguration from our ‘Focus on Poland’ to introduce, as an example of how genre films from that period stand up today.

Girl Geek Dinners: British Women Of Manga Panel – Thursday 29th April 7.00pm


Although there have been notable and successful female comic book creators on both sides of the Atlantic over the last half century, it is the translation of Japanese Manga in the West that has seen considerably more female comics creators join the medium in recent years. This is possibly a combination of Manga having a greater female appeal than traditional Western comics and original Japanese Manga being already created by women in Japan.

To discuss these issues SCI-FI-LONDON have a trio of up and coming UK Manga creators:

• Kate Brown illustrated the Manga Shakespeare adaptation A Midsummer Night’s Dream


• Emma Vieceli is contributing to the comic strip adaptations of the songs of Tori Amos, Comic Book Tattoo and continues to draw an online Manga story, Dragon Heir.

• Karen Rubins found early acclaim for her selfpublished graphic novel The Dark,

Chair: Judith Lewis, one of the founders of Geek Girl Dinners is a veteran of anime conventions and has hosted Shinnenkai events

This is a free event for women only. Men are allowed as guests of a LGGD member. To get your tickets register at http://scifi-london.eventbrite.com

60 Years of Dan Dare - Saturday 1st May 10:30am


Celebrating the continuing popularity of the iconic British Space Hero whose first appearance in the Eagle was published in April 1950, Sci-Fi London presents a quartet of artists who have created new adventures for the lantern jawed pilot in more recent years. Panellists include:

• Garry Leach drew Dan’s return to print in 2000AD for two stories: "The Doomsday Machine" and "Visco", ten years after the end of the original Eagle in the late 1970s and more recently covers for Virgin comics’ revival of the ‘Pilot of the future’ in 2008.

• Rian Hughes drew the Eagle-inspired comic The Science Service in 1989 and then the Mekon’s final revenge in the Thatcherite satire Dare, written by Grant Morrison, in the adult comics Revolver and Crisis a year later.

• Gary Erskine drew Dan Dare’s most recent official comic book adventures in the Virgin Comics periodical of the same name.

• John Freeman is a comics historian and writer, webmaster of downthetubes and the current editor of Titan Books Dan Dare collections. He previous wrote The Science Service and now writes the strip Ex Astris in the Dan Dare-inspired magazine Spaceship Away.

Chair: Duncan Nott historian and presenter on Resonance 104.4 FM, the Arts Council radio station.

Manga Mashup: Make A Comic In A Couple Of Hours - Sat 1st May 11:00am


Inspired by Manga? Want to make a comic of your own? You can do it in just a couple of hours - and you don’t have to draw a line unless you want to! Come and try out comic-making hints, tips and techniques that work for any kind of artist and any style of art. Letraset has provided all the materials, Helen McCarthy provides the method and oils the wheels of your genius if you get stuck, and you bring whatever’s in your head for inspiration. Solo artists/writers, duos and small circles welcome.

FREE EVENT at Project Space, BFI Southbank Limited to 15 places.

What A Marvel - Saturday 1st May 11:45am


With Marvel comic book heroes such as Iron Man and Spider-Man more popular than ever, we look at home-grown additions to the Marvel Universe. Marvel UK was founded in the early 1970s as a British affiliate to the US company, but in 1976 they added original material to their newsagent reprints, starting with Captain Britain and a new pantheon of popular characters over the next three decades. Panellists include:

• Dez Skinn is a pioneering Marvel UK editor who launched titles such as Hulk Comic and Doctor Who Weekly, which featured early work by Alan Moore, David Lloyd, Pat Mills and Dave Gibbons.

• Dan Abnett gave Captain Britain a darker spin in the 1990s by adding him to a new team of heroes with:

• Gary Erskine co-creator of the popular SF / Arthurian themed Knights of Pendragon.

• John Freeman was editor on many of Marvel UK’s early 1990s titles such as weekly comic Overkill, Death’s Head II, Warheads, Killpower and Motormouth, contributing strips to several issues, and was one of the longest-serving editors on the award-winning Doctor Who Magazine.

• Simon Furman was the primary writer for Marvel’s Transformers, a dozen issues of Doctor Who Magazine and creator of Marvel UK’s most memorable SF titles including Dragon Claws and the original Death’s Head.

Chair: Alex Fitch, presenter of the UK’s only weekly radio show on comics, ‘Panel Borders’, broadcast on Resonance 104.4 FM, the Arts Council radio station in London.

Future Publishing? - Sat 1st May 1:00pm


The publishing industry is coming under assault from all sides. Are Kindles, iPads and smartphones signalling the end of traditional paper publishing? Customers no longer believe publishers can justify the prices they charge, not just for books, newspapers, magazines and periodicals are also suffering. How will the publishing industry re-shape itself for 2050? Will Apple and Google become the new big publishing houses? And if ubiquitous digital delivery means anyone can be a publisher, will we even need the big guns anymore?

• Paul Graham-Raven is a freelance writer, editor and webgeek, genre fiction reviewer and editor-in-chief of the near-future science fiction webzine Futurismic.

• Paul Rainey is a cartoonist, illustrator and creator of diary-comic-strip-in-list-form Book of Lists. He is currently serialising his graphic novel, or ‘thick comic book’, There’s No Time Like The Present.

• Mark Charan-Newton is a Blogger, Tweeter and author of debut novel Nights of Villjamur, one of the most critically acclaimed fantasy works of 2009.

• Dave Bradley is Editor-in-Chief of SFX magazine, Europe’s best-selling sci-fi and fantasy title and a fan of all forms of science fiction and fantasy.

Chair: Tom Hunter, Award Administrator for the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction Literature.

Comics And Film - Mon 3rd May 4:00pm


While the cinema seems to be obsessed with comic book adaptations in recent years, this panel looks at the more general phenomenon of the dialogue between comics and film as comic book creators help design movies and draw storyboards for moving pictures and in turn, film has started to dictate the format of modern comics. Panellists include:

• Woodrow Phoenix started off as a small press comic book creator in the vibrant British scene of the 1980s before becoming a popular kids illustrator that lead to such unlikely collaborations as with Mark (Kick-Ass) Millar on Sonic the Comic and lettering Alan Moore's A Small Killing. More recently he has seen his comic Pants Ant turned into an animated pilot by The Cartoon Network and produced the acclaimed graphic novel Rumble Strip which was influenced by film noir and road movies.

• Howard Webster is an award-winning photographer who has combined film and sequential art in the web comic. The Many Worlds of Jonas Moore, which combines comic book art with both images and action movie sequences starring Colin Salmon.

• Cyriak Harris is one of the hottest viral animation creators in the UK and an ident designer for E4. He comes from a background drawing underground comics and sees a direct link with the creation of his CGI cartoons.

Chair: Alex Fitch

• With the exception of the MANGA MASHUP event, all events and screenings take place at the Apollo Piccadilly Cinema, 19 Lower Regent Street, London, SW1Y 4LR.

• Web Link:
www.apollocinemas.com/apollo-piccadilly-circus.aspx

Doctor Who-inspired Star Tigers returns as animated fan project

Altered Vistas, an amateur production company dedicated to creating Doctor Who-related features from the "fringes" of the franchise, has just released its twenty-first animated CGI release - the first chapter of an all-new Star Tigers adventure, plucked from the pages of Doctor Who Weekly. It's a fan project written and fully supported by original Abslom Daak: Dalek Killer and Star Tigers creator and writer Steve Moore himself.

Set in the 26th century universe first seen on Doctor Who in Frontier in Space on TV back in the 1970s, Star Tigers was a follow up story published in Doctor Who Weekly to the hugely popular Abslom Daak - Dalek Killer.

The new animated story sees the Daleks' second greatest enemy heading into Draconian space in an attempt to find help for Princess Taiyin. There, he is taken under the wing of Prince Salander, noble of the Draconian royal court, but their association leads them both into a web of intrigue, bribery, corruption and jealousy that will inevitably end in tragedy.

Steve Moore has also been interviewed by AV for their web site, and has nothing but praise for the Star Tigers project. "I’ve never seen [animator Stuart Palmer] on better form than he is here," he enthuses in a on-site review. "We all know that everything he does is a labour of love, but this is just downright Herculean... The whole thing looks absolutely stunning, and there are some sequences, like the scene where the Killwagon first takes off and heads for space, or the meeting with Vol Mercurius on Dispater, which are just so perfect they make an old fogey like me quite emotional... and that’s to say nothing of the fantastic sets on Draconia and Paradise, where Stuart has picked up the original designs by Steve Dillon and David Lloyd and extended them into wonderful new areas.

"And for all you fans of dead women (!), Taiyin just looks fabulous... what a babe!"

Steve is, perhaps understandably given the passage of time and the sheer volume of material he wrote for various comics back in the 1970s, vague on the origins of Abslom Daak for Doctor Who Weekly. "I’d done a couple of stories about Kroton the Cyberman, and Dez Skinn asked me to come up with a character that would be an independent creation of the magazine, even though it was still set in the Doctor Who universe. Whether it was his idea or mine to include the Daleks, I really can’t remember... it could just have been that it was their 'turn', after we’d worked through some of the other alien races, and so they got included."

Even today, Moore sites Abslom Daak: Dalek Killer and Star Tigers as some of his favourite creations. "I’d been writing for seven or eight years," he reveals, "and, although I’d come up with characters like Kroton the Cyberman, who was still first and foremost a Cyberman, this was the first time since I’d got some experience behind me that someone actually asked me to create my own character. So in many ways it was a breakthrough strip for me.

"It was also very personal. At the time I was deeply depressed over a broken romance, and a lot of that angst went into the first Daak story... it wasn’t just Daak who was feeling suicidal and betrayed. And as I was still carrying around a lot of grief about the lady in question by the time I began writing Star Tigers, so Daak carried the dead Taiyin round with him too, in hope of reviving their love."

Talking about his attitude to "readership ages" - often a bugbear with modern British comic fans bemoaning the patronising format of some modern comic strip story telling in news stand publications, Moore reveals he never used to think about the readership at all, let alone their age when he wrote his many stories for various comics in the 1970s.

"You know, when you’re up against deadlines, all you think is: ‘Come up with a story that works… and before you go to bed this evening.’", he says, answering questions about the Doctor Who strip "K9's Finest Hour". "Naturally I knew I couldn’t handle adult themes like sex or excess violence, but apart from that all my attention was on the story and just getting it done.

"Looking back, I doubt that K9 would have been my first choice of character, so it may have been suggested to me by Dez that we should do a story about him. And once you’ve decided to do a solo story about a robot dog, it pretty much asks for a more humorous treatment. That may be what made the story different from the others, rather than any intention to write for a younger audience."

Also included in the interview is a synopsis for a ten issue mini-series of an Abslom Daak story, After Dark, written by Steve which would have concluded Daak’s story as Steve wanted to tell it.

First discussed at a time when Dan Abnett was heading up new project development at Marvel UK, Moore describes it as "the most complex plot I’d ever come up with, and the outline was written in minute detail."

Unfortunately, Moore notes, the idea was savaged by another Marvel UK editor, John Freeman...

"[He] asked me to cut the story down from ten issues to four, which was absurd, and to concentrate on 'what Daak does best'.. in other words, he wanted a thug with a chainsaw. I wasn’t prepared to chop After Daak about like that, so I made a compromise offer that we’d put that story to one side and I’d write another outline for a four-issue series, which would concentrate on Daak’s youth and early exploits with Mercurius and Selene, for which I jotted down a couple of paragraphs. If that went well, I suggested, we might do After Daak afterwards. But nothing ever came of that idea either, and everything just sort of fizzled out."

John's recollection of events is that both Dan and discussed several ideas for limited series Marvel UK projects. "We shared the same office space at the time," he recalls. "The word came down from Marvel US - probably from either Tom de Falco or Carol Kalish - that ten issue mini series were no longer favoured for costs reasons, and Marvel was seeking to publish four-issue mini series instead to try out new characters. (Proposed projects included a Death's Head revival and a try out for Rourke, a character created by Freeman and Liam Sharp for the Strip comic magazine). The emphasis for these projects also had to be very much on the action, rather than what might have been described as the cereberal."

"Four issues were the minimum Marvel could publish - there was some legal or distribution restriction in the US on publishing three-part mini series, which the company would have preferred."

In the end, neither Steve's ten-part or four-part proposal was ever taken up, although both treatments would almost certainly have been seen by Paul Neary when he took up the reins as Editorial Director at Marvel UK in the 1990s. By that time, Marvel US considered Doctor Who a 'dead' franchise and there was no value to Marvel in seeking to extend a brand they did not themselves own. Instead, Paul developed a range of new characters for the company while also revamping Death's Head, drawn by Liam Sharp.

Daak has, of course, returned to the pages of Doctor Who Magazine several times since his Star Tigers appearance, always to fan enthusiasm.

Unlike other fan groups dedicated to creating additional adventures for the good Doctor, Altered Vistas is dedicated to adapting and bringing to life stories that already exist on the fringes of Who-lore. That covers a broad spectrum of stories, and they're hoping to adapt for the screen as many of them as they can using animated CGI, blended with high quality 2D animation, screen grabs (where appropriate) and high quality stills taken from CGI source, and all assembled against a high quality soundtrack with music, sound effects and the best amateur actors they can get our hands on.

• The second chapter of Star Tigers will be released later in the year. Check out the site www.alteredvistas.co.uk for details of the Star Tigers project and Steve's revealing interview